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Friday, April 1, 2011

One Corporate Sponsored Bill and Republican Down

There's been some flurries outside, as well a flurry of good news for workers' rights supporters today. The first piece of good news, is that Wisconsin Republican Senator Dan Kapanke will suffer a recall election for his vote to strip workers of their collective bargaining rights. Citizens collected enough signatures for the recall election in less than half of the allotted time. More recall election announcements are sure to follow.

The second piece of good news is that Walker administration has rested their case in front of Dane County Judge Sumi, and the restraining order against publishing the bill as law will continue indefinitely. If I'm not mistaken, the appeal process has already started and been sent to the State Supreme Court. The case itself isn't over, as Judge Sumi has asked each side to submit briefs by May 23. There's no plan for a second vote on the collective bargaining bill, and with the success of the recall campaigns, I doubt there will be.

Lastly, today three unions from Madison are suing Scott Walker and the state for trying to enact the collective bargaining bill that strips constitutional rights, those of the freedom of speech and association. This could be a much more important court case than the case to block publishing of the bill, and I'm writing another post with more details.

(By the way, WisPolitics seems to have the best coverage of this issue, mostly unbiased and full of information. The Journal Sentinel is overtly biased towards the Republicans in many articles including the above linked, as they purposely omit vital information and stress Republican arguments. We should expect more from our large newspapers who act as the fourth branch of government.)